I don’t just write romance novels. I write Christian romance novels. So, my stories have to go beyond the “typical” romance novel and focus on two major points of love: Eros, which is the Greek term for romantic love; and Agape, which is the Greek term for the perfect love of God.

How important is love?

1 Corinthians 13 informs us that without love, we are nothing and have nothing. We can have faith to move mountains or knowledge of all things in the universe but without love, we are nothing. We can spend our very lives in service and sacrifice but without love, it isn’t useful or profitable. The remainder of the chapter informs us very accurately about the nature of love.

When I write, I have to have the romantic arc – the romantic story between the male protagonist and the female protagonist. And, I also have to write on the spiritual arc – the love the two main characters have or learn to have for God. In this genre, if you leave out one of those arcs, you pretty much have an incomplete story.

The more I delve into writing about love – about eros and agape love, the more the two intertwine…

Despite the fact that neither one of us were looking for a relationship when we met, within a day of meeting Gregg in person, he and I were talking about marriage. Forget the fact that I was recently separated from my husband of nearly 10 years, forget the fact that it was 3 short months after 9/11 and Gregg was in a Special Forces unit about to deploy, forget the fact that he lived 354 miles away from my house — we KNEW we would be married.

I’m not kidding. I was married, recently separated, and absolutely exhausted. But talking with this beautiful, brilliant man about marriage was the most natural thing in the world. Until that moment in time, I would have said that “love at first sight” was something romance writers like me just used as a plot launch. I would never, ever have believed it to be a real “thing”. But I can tell you in all honesty right now, I fell in love with Gregg the moment we met, and that love has done nothing but multiply over the years.

Marriage is a favorite topic of study for Gregg and me. We have read the books, watched the videos, attended online seminars, listened to sermons, read the Bible, and have garnered a lot of psycho-babble inspiration on what makes a good marriage.

As this is Valentine’s Day, February 14th, and the last day of National Marriage Week, I thought I’d give you our top 5 ways to have a healthy, successful marriage (and these are by no means exclusive) .

With this focus on marriage this week, culminating in Valentine’s Day with a focus on sweethearts and love, think about your marriage and your relationship with your spouse. Is there anything you can do special this week to make him feel special? To let her know how much you appreciate her?

The conflated argument Evans puts forward stands on the proposition that it “should make no difference” whether a wife maintains stewardship over her subjective appearance — that such stewardship or lack thereof ought to have absolutely no impact on her husband’s daily battle with sexual temptation.

While Pastor Challies starts his article by pointing out the red herring Evans cooked up — that if wives slouch off on their appearance, husbands will cheat on them — that isn’t what he chooses to focus on in the main thrust. Challies makes the case that while YES appearance counts in marriage, he dispels the notion that becoming a slob absolves your spouse of any sin. Further, he draws the distinction between naturally growing old and living life with what he calls inward and outward appearance.

When a wife rejects or belittles her husband’s sexual needs, she very obviously HARMS his ability to avoid improper sexual impulses. But that isn’t entirely what either of these cited truth claims state. The truth claim in each of the above cases expands on that accepted fact by stating that when a wife ignores (a) her appearance and (b) her husband’s sexual needs, she is NOT HELPING him to avoid sexual temptation.